Ghostgirl: Hawthorne Nightmare
by purplepenguin.jc
Summary: How could anything happen after Charlotte? Why are things happening that shouldn't? Hawthorne is far from finished where dead kids are concerned!
1. Popularity is important! To me anyway

**Ghostgirl: Hawthorne Nightmare**

**AN: This is between Rest in Popularity and Homecoming**

**Disclaimer: I do not own the characters in this story, they belong to Tonya Hurley, The author of the Ghostgirl series **

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**Chapter 1: Popularity matters, to me anyway**

I half-walked half-strutted down the hallway of Hawthorne High on the first day of term two. Over the holidays I had wondered. What did I have to do to earn back my popularity? Did I have to lose weight? Did I have to wear cooler clothes? I took all of these theories into consideration. I had sat and stared at magazines for hours on end, exercised, ate lots of salad and cut down on the junk food, because I had realized I had become a little chubby. I went on a major shopping spree, so this term was gonna rule and I, Renee Ashley, was going to become popular. My dream was to hang out with the cooler girls older than me, that was very cool, it made me feel like one of them, popular. I was wearing a tight, very short miniskirt; which I had walked the neighbours dogs 3 kilometres a week for, and the cutest pink spaghetti strap singlet, not to mention the most uncomfortable, stylish, black, expensive ballet flats I could afford. I strutted past my target group of older girls, Melissa Kingsley and her posse. I gave them a small wave. Melissa scowled at me. I flicked my hair and strutted straight past. Another girl gasped and pointed at me.

"Little rat, that's MY miniskirt!"

I stopped in my tracks and turned around. The whole hallway was staring at me, and the girl and Melissa were death staring me with determination. The girl strutted right up to me and glared at me

"That is MY skirt. Take it off."

She commanded. I had made a lot of changes, but I didn't have enough confidence to withstand total humiliation.

"Um, no," I squeaked nervously "Wrong answer twerp." She snarled angrily and ripped my skirt off!

I screamed. Yep. I screamed and ran straight out the doors and into the open. Big mistake! There were explosions of laughter all over the courtyard. I felt exposed and embarrassed. With tears in my eyes I ran into an alley alongside the building and covered myself with a plastic bag. It was gritty and disgusting but it was better than nothing. I cried and cried. I missed when I used to be popular in primary school. My life had been as good as it gets up until year 8. I was one of the coolest girls around in primary school, so you would have thought it would be the same here. In primary school we didn't have as many worries about weight and clothes. We still had a somewhat superior status though, I seem to have lost that status. Here I was no one. My friends had all gone to other schools. I had kept slight contact with them during year 8, but they moved on and I became friendless.

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**Sorry this chapter is short, the first few chapters will all be fairly short, I think.**


	2. I'M WHAT

**Disclaimer: Sadly, I do not own Ghostgirl or any of the characters.**

**Chapter 2: I'm what?**

I heard footsteps. I looked up sheepishly. A strange looking man was coming towards me. I cowered in my corner. He had a horrific face. One eye was milky white, he was half blind and the other was dark as night. In his right hand there was…a knife. I screamed uncontrollably. The man pulled me up and slammed me up against the wall behind me. He smacked his hand to my mouth,

"shut up or I will stab you!"

He whispered fiercely. He held up the knife. I bit his hand angrily. It tasted of cigarettes and beer, disgusting. He yelled in disgust and pain and released me. I tried to make a run for it. Tears of sadness and fear ran down my face. He ran behind me and tackled me, crushing me to the pavement. I swear I heard a rib crack.

"Say one more word girlie and I'll…"

I couldn't control myself. I screamed hysterically. He stabbed the knife into my back. I felt the cold metal going through my skin and muscle. I screamed weakly as blood ran down my back. The last thing I saw was Melissa's paper white face as she fainted in shock, then everything went black and a bright light flashed before my eyes.

When I woke I was still lying in the alley. Wait a minute; didn't a guy just stab me? I stood up. I still had a plastic bag wrapped around my waist. I turned around to find my body on the ground still, the knife sticking out of my back and blood flowing from the wound. I screamed loudly in shock. I felt around the spot in my own back. The knife was there! I tried to pull it out. It slipped out of the wound easily, but I felt no pain. That's really creepy. I though uneasily. I walked out into the courtyard. There was an ambulance and police. Some policemen were supporting a paper white and shaking Melissa, who was pointing towards me. I yelled and waved. She took no notice of me and neither did the police. Couldn't they see me?

Melissa gasped and fainted all over again when she saw my body lying on the ground. The police ran with Melissa back to the ambulance and got the paramedics with a stretcher. They ran over, and loaded my body onto the stretcher, "Wait, hello I'm over here!" I waved my arms around frantically. They took no notice what so ever! Weird. I followed them to the ambulance and hopped in the back while people comforted melissa and the medics frantically tried to stop the blood flow from my back and resuscitate me. I felt my own pulse and heartbeat. Nothing! Ok, that's bizarre and scary. I began to hyperventilate. Wait a minute, I'm not fainting or gasping or anything! That must mean I'm actually dead. Oh my God, I'M DEAD!

**Hope you enjoyed the new chapter! See that button down there? I beg you to press it! Please review!**


	3. Could This Day Be Any Worse?

Chapter 3: how much worse can this day get?

I ran down the long hallway of the hospital after the bed carrying Melissa, as the doctors wheeled the bed down the hallway. They put her in a ward to have a check-up. I sat in a chair opposite her bed and began to read one the magazines on the table beside me. Suddenly, Melissa's arms flew towards her face and she began to scream. I saw that her eyes were closed still. I cowered in the corner as doctors rushed back into the ward.

"No, NOOOO DON'T KILL HER NOOOOOOOOOOOO!"

Renee winced as she squealed and writhed. The doctors were whispering to her.

"It's okay Melissa, that girl is in a better place now, you have nothing to worry about, just calm down."

Renee snorted. They didn't even know her name. The writhing and screaming continued until finally, Melissa woke and began to wail and cry. Renee listened to Melissa's every word. She snorted again in disbelief. Everything Melissa said was about herself. She knew Melissa was self-obsessed, but even for her, in this situation how could she only think about herself? Renee left the ward and ran down the hall with tears in her eyes. Nobody cared about her. They only worried about Melissa and her witnessing my death and fainting and having violent dreams.

"Excuse me; I am the one who ACTUALLY DIED! My body is probably still in the alley on the ground, rotting!"

Renee thought sourly. She ran out of the hospital and tripped on a loose paver on the ground. She went flying forwards and smacked her head on a concrete pillar.

"That probably cracked my skull, but who even cares anymore."

Renee muttered, not that she needed to. Nobody could hear her anyway. She went to the bus stop and waited for the next bus to Hawthorne High.

Twenty minutes later, the bus arrived at the stop. Renee was the last in line. Just as she put her arm through the door, reaching for the railing, the driver abruptly closed the doors, leaving Renee's arm trapped inside the bus. Renee sighed as the bus left the stop, dragging her along the road like an old rag. She didn't care what happened to her anymore, there was just no point. She thought about Melissa again. She would never accept this kind of treatment. She would be dragged along with her arm trapped, screaming at the driver and at all the passing cars. Renee chuckled at the thought.

When the bus finally opened its doors at Hawthorne High, there was a police car parked outside and crime scene tape all over the alley where she had been stabbed. There was a chalk outline of where her body had lay on the concrete. So that's all she was now, a chalk line on the ground. She walked through the front doors of Hawthorne High, just to see what was going on. There was not a person in sight. Pipes dripped and the ceiling was covered in mould where the rain had seeped through.

"That's rather odd; I have never noticed that before."

Renee remarked to herself. A girl in an ugly gingham dress and pigtails came rushing down the hallway and grabbed her arm.  
"Where on the planet have you been! We have been waiting for you for hours!"  
She rasped in a croaky voice. I allowed myself to be dragged by the arm down the hallway. I looked at her in disgust as a maggot crawled out of her ear.

We arrived at a classroom I had never noticed before, which was odd since it was her second year at this school. Inside there was an old projector, which was playing a movie. A tall lady appeared in front of the desk she was sitting in at the back of the room. Renee looked up at her and winced in horror. The woman's face was mutilated with harsh burns, and loose strips of bandages covered her arms and legs. She wore an orange, Audrey Hepburn style dress with a white sash around the middle.  
"Oh, there you are Renee, finished breaking down over your death?"

She said in an unusually deep voice. A flake of burnt flesh fell off her face as she spoke. Renee nodded silently. The lady flicked another loose flake of flesh away irritably. It landed on the gingham girl's desk. She pushed it onto the floor like this was completely normal.  
"My name, as most of you know, is Miss Goldthorpe. I am a Dead Ed teacher. You will all strive to achieve your goals, which once you have done; you will pass on to a better place. Everyone has one, and you must all complete this goal for us all to pass on. Is this understood?"

A mumble of "yes Miss Goldthorpe" rippled around the classroom. She walked to my desk and dumped an old, heavy book in front of her, titled 'Deadiquette'.

"Learn the things in this book and use them wisely." Miss Goldthorpe snapped. I gulped and nodded, then followed the other 'dead' kids to the cafeteria.


	4. How To Be Optimistic About Death

**AN: Wow, I decided to update…Aren't you a lucky bunch. Enjoy. And yeah, my name is Jessica but I act nothing like the Jessica mentioned in this chapter. Rated T for horror and some language. **

Everyone sat scattered around the abandoned cafeteria. I observed quietly as I lined up to get my food.

"On second thoughts…" I mumbled and dumped my tray back on the pile as I realized what was being served, a collection of junky, fatty foods that I'd been trying my hardest to avoid in the last month.

"Gee…I haven't seen those in a long time." I muttered to myself again as I walked past a collection of drinks, Dr. Peppers being included in the small collection. I grabbed one and sat at an empty table, fiddling with the can, too depressed to open it and contemplate drinking it.

"Hi…down in the dumps eh?" An unfamiliar, cheery voice met my ears.

The stranger dumped her over-filled tray down beside me. I looked up at her face; the girl had a bronzy tan with chocolate brown eyes while wild, dark brown curls stuck out in every direction around her, not chubby, but very full face.

"Yeah…" I mumbled dismally.

"Why's that?" She questioned, munching on a choc-chip cookie as she talked.

"Well, I thought it would be kind of obvious. I'm DEAD. My life has ended, my dreams are shattered, and it's all over." I stated bluntly.

"Well, that's a negative way of putting it," She remarked, cramming another cookie into her mouth.

"I'm Sagira by the way, I moved from Egypt the year before I was killed. I can't recall the reason exactly, but my parents were in some messy shit with someone or other, I was kidnapped, and I 'smart-talked' two of the guys who kidnapped me, it seems I deeply offended one of them, so he strangled me to death." Sagira mumbled loudly through her cookies.

My heart instantly went out to the girl, who I noticed was wearing a form-fitting, white, dirt-streaked t-shirt and faded blue jeans. Her face showed little emotion that wasn't happiness. I wondered how she could talk about such a terrible experience so carelessly.

"I-I'm sorry, that's terrible…" I looked up sorrowfully at the cheerful girl.

"It's not a problem, as you said, we're dead, it's all over, I'm not going to sit around and feel sorry for myself forever, the past is the past, we're going to move on to a better place." She smiled,

"I can't wait!" She added, several crumbs flying out of her mouth and across the empty table.

I was surprised as I looked down at Sagira's figure. She was as skinny as a runway supermodel, despite the fact that she was now chowing down more fat then I consumed in a month.

The girl with the God-awful gingham dress approached us and sat down next to me.

"Hi Renee, sorry I forgot to formally introduce myself earlier. My name is Georgie, and I died in a car accident, my family and brother survived, but another car smashed into the side where I was sitting. I was rushed to hospital, but I was dead by the time I got there…serious brain damage apparently…" She chattered brightly.

"I forgot to ask you how you died…but judging by the gaping hole in your back, you got stabbed…though…" Sagira said, talking through her food again.

She looked down in confusion at the filthy plastic bag that was hanging uselessly around my waist.

"I don't want to talk about it…" I mumbled as I cracked open my Dr. Pepper and took a swig.

"Ok then, maybe another time." Sagira replied quietly, gazing down into the ice cream she had just started.

"I suppose we better tell you who everyone is." Georgie quickly changed the subject.

She pointed to a group of boys sitting around a table in the middle of the room, laughing and joking as living boys would, except pulling maggots out of each other's ears as a joke. I cringed in disgust.

"That's Sam, Kyle, Jordan, Harry and Nick." Georgie continued, pointing to each boy as she went.

Georgie pointed to another table, where two girls were sitting up proudly, wearing fashionable clothing. They looked like the kind of people who hung out with the popular girls, like Melissa, I had aspired to be like.

"Those two are Patrice and Courtney, they got into drugs, hung out on the streets, once they massively over-dosed on cocaine and had been binge drinking, they were both rushed to hospital, had their stomachs pumped and charcoal shoved down their throats but couldn't be saved. They're such stupid, stupid girls…" Georgie whispered distastefully.

"What about her…" I whispered, pointing to a girl sitting all alone, in a corner on the opposite side of the room.

I eyed her dyed-black hair, that was razor cut into an uneven, jagged bob, her clothes were all black and ripped, and eyeliner was caked on her eyelids, defining her piercing blue orbs. She wore blood red lipstick, I shuddered as she added to the gashes on her wrist with a pocket knife she had been twirling aimlessly.

"That's Jessica Goldthorpe. She's Miss Goldthorpe's niece, depression ran in her family, and she died the same way her aunt did." Georgie whispered solemnly.

I gasped softly,

"Did she…" I asked softly.

"Yep…she committed suicide…" Georgie concluded sadly.

I glanced over at Jessica, just as her eyes locked on mine, and my gaze drifted down to a deep cut, the only flaw gouged into the pale, thin skin on her throat.

She twirled her pocket knife dangerously and glared at me. I quickly turned away, and silently stood to leave as the bell rang.


	5. The Incident With Suicidal Jessica

I trudged back into class, everyone looked dead bored, and yes, that pun was intended. I smiled at the lame joke; anything remotely amusing could make me smile right now. What else was I supposed to say…yay, I'm dead, boo hoo, I'm dead? My mind was completely blank, and I was also feeling pretty sorry for myself, despite what Sagira had told me earlier. I never got to be popular or hang out with the people I wanted to. In fact, I managed to mentally scar the very girl I idolized so much.

"Well done Renee, Melissa would totally want to hang out with you now…"

I thought sarcastically, before I started to wonder at my sudden sarcastic, hopeless humour.

I guess it's because it's all over, maybe it hasn't fully sunk in yet. Surprisingly, I didn't really miss my life, after meeting Sagira and Georgie, who could talk so easily about their own death. Maybe if I'd succeeded in my endeavor to increase my popularity, I would miss it. I miss it less than I expected. But, this still sucks. It sucks, sucks, sucks, and sucks some more. I sighed and let my head slip out of my hands, my forehead landing on my desk with a loud thunk. A sharp voice jolted me out of my thoughts.

"Miss Ashley, I would appreciate it if you looked at me and listened to what I am saying, because it is very important and what you are doing is incredibly rude!" Miss Goldthorpe snapped angrily.

I looked up sheepishly as a bit of flesh flaked off her face, nestling itself in my hair. My nose crinkled in disgust but I refrained from removing it until Miss Goldthorpe has finished glaring at me.

"Ew…" I murmured quietly, as Miss Goldthorpe returned to the front of the classroom and I flicked the piece of flesh out of my mousy brown hair. I gagged as the flesh stuck to my finger; I shook it off hurriedly, and continued to gag, due to throwing up being impossible. Miss Goldthorpe turned her gaze on me again, and the rest of the class turned to stare at me.

"Is there a problem Miss Ashley?" Miss Goldthorpe questioned sharply, her eyes blazing.

"No Miss…" I muttered

Jessica sneered from behind me.

"Stupid bimbo," She hissed in my ear, jabbing the back of my neck with her pocket knife.

"Bitch…" I retorted angrily.

Jessica lost her temper. She stood, tipped my desk and my chair over, sending me sprawling to the floor.

"THAT'LL TEACH YOU TO CALL ME A BITCH AND TO STARE AT ME IN THE CAFETERIA, WON'T IT? Just as well you were killed; the realm of the living could get rid of more stupid bimbos like you!" Jessica yelled angrily, kicking me on the ground as she spoke.

"Jess…" Miss Goldthorpe warned sharply.

I shielded my face and head with my arms, curling up more tightly with each kick, feeling no physical pain, but on the inside, what she was saying hurt me.

Jessica stormed out of the room, hurling her pocket knife at the wall opposite the classroom door, the blade landed in the old plaster with a thud, sticking there for a moment before the wall around it crumbled, bringing half the plaster on the wall down with it.

Georgie stood, helped replace my upended desk and chair to their original positions and returned to her seat without another word.

Miss Goldthorpe stood at the front of the class, silent.

"Class dismissed, meet at the manor at six sharp." She stated bluntly, waving her hand at our class and walking out to find Jessica.

I stood and Sagira and Georgia rushed to my side.

"Are you ok? Don't worry about Jessica, she has temper issues." Sagira chatted, putting a hand on my shoulder.

"Now we get to go show you where we live, Hawthorne Manor." Georgie's solemn expression turned into a grin, and she and Sagira took my arms and led me out the door.


	6. NOTICE

**NOTICE TO ALL READERS**

You may've noticed I haven't updated in a while.

Well, unfortunately for those who like my story, I won't be updating again, ever.

Nor will I be putting any further stories on my Fanfiction account.

People who gave me good constructive criticism and praised my efforts, thank you.

People who didn't bother with anything except, 'don't change from 3rd person to 1st person' thanks but you don't need to keep saying it, I am aware of this but I'm too lazy to fix it.

There was one review I had recently that was completely correct but I really didn't find 'Oh my God. You can not write' necessary at all. This is the first Fanfiction story I ever attempted…but thank you for the other advice.

As for the other flamer, go away, I don't like you, some of your advice was helpful, but the rest was rude.

Bye everyone, making a new account but you won't find me, writing a different genre of Fanfiction now.

p.s WingedSkywire you are awesome :)


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